it's not as though the pentagon didn't know about this for 50 minutes. reports have shown that the commander, general hamm, was at the pentagon that day, ordered an aerial drone -- unarmed, maybe they didn't have armed assets available -- but he's looking at any number of things. commanders, critical information requirements, friendly forces, priority intelligence requirements, different triggers in a command center that say, okay, now it's time the tell the commander something more about this. who in his case would be the chairman of the joint chiefs or the secretary of defense. i've got to believe an ambassador under siege fits one of those critical intelligence or information requirements that would mean a notification of the people that can make the call to send even more assets. africom doesn't have much at their disposal at that moment. it should have been done sooner. shannon: we know at some point a personal distress button was signaled from the mission there in benghazi. there were certainly signs that there was an immediate, pressing need. so w